Mad Ember

9: Flashbacks

The songs I add before a chapter hint to the feelings and messages that will rise within it. It gives my characters a real voice. It brings them to life. All songs will be provided! :) And the playlist is on spotify!

S O N G F O R C H A P T E R : "Soldier"
B Y : Fleurie

"Soldier keep on marching on,
Head down til the work is done"

"Ember come on! It's not that far, I'll catch you just jump!" Josiah yelled from the bottom of the tree that Ember had somehow found herself stuck in. She only paid attention to how high she could climb, and of course, she wanted to break Matt's record. But now, as she stared down the trunk of the tree, she realized truly just how high she climbed.

It wasn't bad at first. In fact, Ember enjoyed it until it was time to climb back down. Up there, she could see everything. She saw the tips of the trees that usually would go unseen. She saw the tops of the houses that were shiny and blinded her eyes if she looked too long. But what she enjoyed looking at most were the tall fences that showed where the radiation was simply too high to be habitable. From the ground, they just looked like steel, unmoving skyscrapers. But from here, she could see what was beyond them. It almost felt... dangerous.

"Em come on! You can do it!" She took another deep breath looking down the tree trunk to her friend Matt. Not too long ago, he was up here beside her. But then he had to use the bathroom, and she was left alone. She just shook her head and clung tighter to the tree trunk.

"I can't!" She huffed as fat tears poured down her cheeks. "I'm scared!"

"Ember! I'll catch you! You have to come down, it's almost past designated curfew!" Ember just rolled her eyes. She was currently mad at the sector. How dare they shorten her already short curfew! Before she could only stay out until 10:00pm and now they made it at 8:00pm... 8:00pm?!

"Ember, the guards will be coming soon. Our evacuation day could be canceled if we get even one violation. You have to jump." Josiah didn't have much luck getting Ember down. It was already bad enough that he had to come out here. He was trying to rationalize with a scared, headstrong nine-year-old who thought the world was just fine. Ember didn't want to jump, from where she was, she knew that it would hurt and she might even break a bone. The thought made her shiver. She had never broken a single bone in her life... not one.

"Em! I'll come up and help you down!" Matt shouted. She let out a breath of relief. Finally, an idea she could agree with. Of course, Matty would be the one to come up with a genius idea like that. He was the only smart one at the base of the tree. Josiah grabbed Matt's arm.

"No. You need to go back home. I'm sure your mom won't want your evacuation day canceled because of Ember." Matt hesitated. He didn't want to go, his friend needed his help, and he had the power to help her. Josiah pushed him away.

"Scram, kid." Ember watched as Josiah bullied Matt into leaving, and the tears returned once again.

"Josiah, you ass! Bring him back!" The profanity was a regular occurrence for Ember. She heard them all the time. At first, she thought that she might get in trouble, but nobody seemed to care. That or they were just not paying any attention.

"Ember." Now that voice was definitely more scary than how high she was. Even if she could, she didn't want to climb down the tree. "What have you done now?" Ember wished that the tree would just kinda, suck her up, maybe swallow her? She thought that she would make a pretty good tree. She would make sure to have big fat branches all over the place. That way, people would be able to climb up and down.

"Ember. Get down here. Don't fight with me on this." Her dad's voice was loud and demanding. He had had enough of this girl recently. She just seemed to always find trouble. She was a magnet for it, and it annoys the hell out of him. Ember continued to shake her head against the tree, the bark scratching at her soft skin.

Looking down, she saw her dad and Josiah talking in whispers. Ember wanted to know what they were talking about. It was probably her; she was the reason they were both at the bottom of a tree in the middle of a field with only ten minutes left to curfew in the first place. Her dad yelled something at Josiah, she thought that maybe she had imagined it, but she could have sworn that he slapped him.

Now she was confused as to what was happening. Just a second ago, her dad was persistent in getting her down, but now he sat on the hood of his beat-up, forest green pick up truck, and watched Ember with a heated stare and a knowing smirk. Then something hard hit her head. Her brows furrowed as she rubbed the sore spot. Did an acorn just fall on her head? Was the sky falling? Is that what the radiation did?

It happened again. This time it was a sharp sting on Ember's arm. "Ow!" She looked down the tree to see Josiah throwing rocks at her. She tried to shift away from the assault, but if she moved, she would lose her footing and fall.